Tam Ngoc Tram – The DREAM Act Loses an Advocate

For years now, Congress has debated whether to pass the DREAM Act. The DREAM Act would give a future to undocumented youth through a conditional path to citizenship and it would have legalized people like Tam Ngoc Tran who died earlier this week in a tragic car accident.

Tam was a native of Garden Grove, California, born in Germany to Vietnamese refugees. She was pursuing a doctorate at Brown University. She was a graduate of UCLA, and she was a tireless DREAM Act Advocate, having testified before Congress in favor of its passage.

Tam, herself was undocumented and found removable by an immigration judge who denied her and her family political asylum. On appeal, the Board of Immigration Appeals found that the family could not return to Vietnam because of fear of political persecution, so the US could not remove the family to Vietnam. Having been born in Germany, the government sought to remove her to her birthplace, yet Germany refused to grant her entry. Tam was stateless. The only home she knew was the United States.

This tragic accident took the life of another passenger, a fellow UCLA graduate and DREAM Act activist, Cinthya Felix. Romben Law, APC offers condolences to the families of both Tam and Cinthya. –ecf